Harm Mediates the Disgust-Immorality Link

Chelsea Schein, Ryan Ritter, & Kurt Gray
Emotion, in press

Abstract

Many acts are disgusting, but only some of these acts are immoral. Dyadic morality predicts that
disgusting acts should be judged as immoral to the extent that they seem harmful. Consistent
with this prediction, three studies reveal that perceived harm mediates the link between feelings
of disgust and moral condemnation—even for ostensibly harmless “purity” violations. In many
cases, accounting for perceived harm completely eliminates the link between disgust and moral
condemnation. Analyses also reveal the predictive power of anger and typicality/weirdness in
moral judgments of disgusting acts. The mediation of disgust by harm holds across diverse acts
including gay marriage, sex acts, and religious blasphemy. Revealing the endogenous presence
and moral relevance of harm within disgusting-but-ostensibly-harmless acts argues against
modular accounts of moral cognition such as moral foundations theory. Instead, these data
support pluralistic conceptions of harm and constructionist accounts of morality and emotion.
Implications for moral cognition and the concept of “purity” are discussed.

The article is here.

The role of emotion in ethics and bioethics: dealing with repugnance and disgust

Mark Sheehan
J Med Ethics 2016;42:1-2
doi:10.1136/medethics-2015-103294

Here is an excerpt:

But what generally are we to say about the role of emotions in ethics and in ethical judgement? We tend to sharply distinguish ‘mere’ emotions or emotional responses from reasoned or rational argument. Clearly, it would seem, if we are to make claims about rightness or wrongness they should be on the basis of reasons and rational argument. Emotions look to be outside of this paradigm concerned as they are with our responses to the world rather than the world itself and the clear articulation of inferential relationships within it. Most importantly emotions are felt subjectively and so cannot lay any generalised claim on others (particularly others who do not feel as the arguer does). The subjectivity of emotions means that they cannot function in arguments because, unless they are universal, they cannot form the basis of a claim on another person. The reason they cannot form this basis is because that other person may not have that emotion: relying on it means the argument can only apply to those who do. An argument that relies on feeling particular emotions, particularly emotions that we don't all feel in the same way, is weak to that extent and certainly weaker than one that does not.

In the case at hand, repugnance or disgust only have persuasive power to those who feel these emotions in response to human reproductive cloning. If all people felt one or the other, then claims based on an appeal to repugnance or disgust would have persuasive power over all of us. But even if these were generally or commonly felt emotions here, such persuasive power would be distinct from an argument's having persuasive power over us because of the reasons it provides for us independently of contingently felt emotions. An argument then that is based on an appeal to emotion apparently as Kass' and Kekes' apparently are, can, at best, be only as strong as the generalisability of the empirical claim about the relevant emotion.

The article is here.

The ‘blame and shame society’

Jean Knox
Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy
Volume 28, Issue 3, 2014

Abstract

In this opinion piece, I explore some of the social and cultural factors that contribute to the creation of feelings of shame in those members of society who are vulnerable or disadvantaged in various ways. I suggest that a ‘blame and shame’ attitude has become pervasive in today's political culture, reassuring the comfortable and privileged that they deserve their own success and allowing them to blame the disadvantaged for their own misfortune. Those who feel that they must become invulnerable in order to succeed therefore project their own vulnerable child onto the vulnerable in our society and attack and condemn in others what they most fear in themselves.

Introduction

One of the most intractable problems all therapists encounter is shame – the persistent negative sense of self that is evident when patients persist in describing themselves as disgusting, bad, dirty and all the other words of self-loathing which reflect a deeply painful self-hatred that the person clings to in spite of all attempts to shift it. These feelings are often accompanied by self-harm of various kinds – repeated cutting or overdosing, alcohol or drug abuse, eating disorders and by difficulty in affect regulation, mentalisation, attachment and sexuality.

An understanding of the unique personal relationships that have contributed to this kind of self-disgust and shame is vital if psychotherapists are to help their patients as effectively as possible. Herman (1992) first identified this as one key part of complex PTSD, suggesting that it arises from chronic developmental trauma.

The entire article is here.

The curious tale of Julie and Mark: Unraveling the moral dumbfounding effect

Edward B. Royzman, Kwanwoo Kim, Robert F. Leeman
Judgment and Decision Making, Vol. 10, No. 4, July 2015, pp. 296–313

Abstract

The paper critically reexamines the well-known “Julie and Mark” vignette, a stylized account of two college-age siblings opting to engage in protected sex while vacationing abroad (e.g., Haidt, 2001). Since its inception, the story has been viewed as a rhetorically powerful validation of Hume’s “sentimentalist” dictum that moral judgments are not rationally deduced but arise directly from feelings of pleasure or displeasure (e.g., disgust). People’s typical reactions to the vignette are alleged to support this view by demonstrating that individuals are prone to become morally dumbfounded (Haidt, 2001; Haidt, Bjorklund, & Murphy, 2000), i.e., they tend to “stubbornly” maintain their disapproval of the act without supporting reasons. In what follows, we critically reassess the traditional account, predicated on the notion that, among other things, most subjects simply fail to be convinced that the siblings’ actions are truly harm-free, thus having excellent reasons to disapprove of these acts. In line with this critique, 3 studies found that subjects 1) tended not to believe that the siblings’ actions were in fact harmless; 2) notwithstanding that, and in spite of holding a number of “counterargument-immune” reasons, subjects could be effectively maneuvered into exhibiting all the trademark signs of a morally dumbfounded state (which they subsequently recanted), and 3) with subjects’ beliefs about harm and standards of normative evaluation properly factored in, a more rigorous assessment procedure yielded a dumbfounding estimate of about 0. Based on these and related results, we contend that subjects’ reactions are wholly in line with the rationalist model of moral judgment and that their use in support of claims of moral arationalism should be reevaluated.

The entire article is here.

We all feel disgust but why do some of us turn it on ourselves?

By Jane Simpson and Phillip Powell
The Conversation
Originally posted March 27, 2015

Here is an excerpt:

Self-disgust differs from other negative feelings that people have about themselves in a number of ways. While self-disgust is likely to happen alongside other self-directed issues such as shame, unique features include feelings of revulsion, for example when looking in the mirror, contamination and magical rather than reasoned thinking. These, taken with other characteristics, such as its particular cognitive-affective content, suggest an emotional experience that is different to shame (related to hierarchical submission and diminished social rank).

Disgust is not about just “not liking” aspects of yourself – the depth of the emotion can mean you can’t even look at yourself without being overwhelmed with revulsion. The feeling that you are disgusting also means that you are potentially toxic to others – so people can become isolated as they do not wish to “infect” and “contaminate” others with their own perceived “disgustingness”.

The entire post is here.

Editor's Note: This article pertains to psychotherapy with trauma, personality disorders, and eating disorders.

On Disgust and Moral Judgment

By David Pizarro, Yoel Inbar, and Chelsea Helion
Emotion Review, Vol 3, No. 3 (July 2011), 267-268.

Abstract

Despite the wealth of recent work implicating disgust as an emotion central to human morality, the nature of the causal relationship between disgust and moral judgment remains unclear. We distinguish between three related claims regarding this relationship, and argue that the most interesting claim (that disgust is a moralizing emotion) is the one with the least empirical support.

The entire article is here.

Advances in Experimental Moral Psychology

Hagop Sarkissian and Jennifer Cole Wright (eds.), Advances in Experimental Moral Psychology, Bloomsbury, 2014, 256pp., $112.00 (hbk), ISBN 9781472509383.

Reviewed by Jesse S. Summers, Duke University
Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews

The distinction between moral psychology and moral philosophy has never been a clear one. Observations about what humans are like plays an indispensable role in understanding our moral obligations and virtues, and great swaths of moral philosophy until the 19th century are psychology avant la lettre, empirical speculations about how we form moral judgments, about mental faculties and rationality, pleasure, pain, and character. This relationship between philosophy and psychology becomes both opaque and strained once experimental psychology develops its own academic discipline. Nevertheless, many contemporary moral debates -- like those surrounding moral character and moral motivation -- are clearly aware of and are sometimes in response to findings of empirical psychology. Experimental psychology is again leaching into the philosophical water.

It is a credit to Hagop Sarkissian and Jennifer Cole Wright that the research they assembled adds further nutrients to the soil. This collection is not a survey of empirical moral psychology. It instead pushes into debates whose philosophical implications have yet to be widely considered. As a result, the collection's primary audience is anyone already interested in moral psychology understood broadly, and it will need no further recommendation to those with empirical interests in the topic.

The entire book review is here.

Religiosity, Political Orientation, and Consequentialist Moral Thinking

By Jared Piazza and Paulo Sousa
Social Psychological and Personality Science April 2014 vol. 5 no. 3 334-342

Abstract

Three studies demonstrated that the moral judgments of religious individuals and political conservatives are highly insensitive to consequentialist (i.e., outcome-based) considerations. In Study 1, both religiosity and political conservatism predicted a resistance toward consequentialist thinking concerning a range of transgressive acts, independent of other relevant dispositional factors (e.g., disgust sensitivity). Study 2 ruled out differences in welfare sensitivity as an explanation for these findings. In Study 3, religiosity and political conservatism predicted a commitment to judging “harmless” taboo violations morally impermissible, rather than discretionary, despite the lack of negative consequences rising from the act. Furthermore, non-consequentialist thinking style was shown to mediate the relationship religiosity/conservatism had with impermissibility judgments, while intuitive thinking style did not. These data provide further evidence for the influence of religious and political commitments in motivating divergent moral judgments, while highlighting a new dispositional factor, non-consequentialist thinking style, as a mediator of these effects.

The entire article is here.

Defending Disgust

By Jason A. Clark and Philip A. Powell
Emotional Researcher

Many argue that moral disgust developed as a regulator of social behavior, and that it still dutifully serves that purpose (Tybur et al. 2013). However, a growing number have criticised disgust as a morally objectionable emotion in modern society, emphasizing features that, while adaptive in response to pathogens, render disgust unsuitable for policing morality (Nussbaum 2009; Kelly 2011; Bloom 2013). These include: cognitive and behavioral inflexibility, the generation of “dumbfounded” moral judgments lacking reasons, insensitivity to contextual factors and reappraisal, dehumanization, and a focus on the whole person, rather than their actions (Schnall et al. 2008; Russell & Giner-Sorolla 2011).

Critics of disgust compare it unfavorably with other moral emotions (especially anger), which they hold to be more flexible and reasoned, and lump it together with related emotions such as shame, which are often viewed negatively for similar reasons. Specifically moral critiques of disgust have been largely qualitative, based on historical case studies and anecdotal examples. Arguments condemning disgust as a moral emotion emphasise disgust’s negative role in instances of stigmatization, such as homophobia, racism, and genocide.

The entire article is here.

Disgust and biological descriptions bias logical reasoning during legal decision-making

By Beatrice Capestany and Lasana T. Harris
Social Neuroscience
Originally posted February 27, 2014
DOI:10.1080/17470919.2014.892531

Legal decisions often require logical reasoning about the mental states of people who perform gruesome behaviors. We use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine how brain regions implicated in logical reasoning are modulated by emotion and social cognition during legal decision-making. Participants read vignettes describing crimes that elicit strong or weak disgust matched on punishment severity using the US Federal Sentencing Guidelines. An extraneous sentence at the end of each vignette described the perpetrator’s personality using traits or biological language, mimicking the increased use of scientific evidence presented in courts. Behavioral results indicate that crimes weak in disgust receive significantly less punishment than the guidelines recommend. Neuroimaging results indicate that brain regions active during logical reasoning respond less to crimes weak in disgust and biological descriptions of personality, demonstrating the impact of emotion and social cognition on logical reasoning mechanisms necessary for legal decision-making.

The entire article is here.

Loving animals and eating meat: The Meat Paradox

By Brock Bastian

New Philosopher

Originally posted March 11, 2014

Here is an excerpt:

Of course consuming animals that are not considered food can create all kinds of squeamishness. Consider the recent horsemeat scandal. People created all kinds of reasons for their feeling of disgust at eating horsemeat, including health safety concerns, but of course horsemeat has been consumed safely for years.

I would argue that the issue was far more closely related to the fact that horses are seen as pets and not food. The idea of eating pets is indeed disgusting.

If people try to avoid the connection between meat and animals, what happens when they are forced to make this link? In other research we have shown that asking people to think about animals being killed for food leads them to attribute fewer mental qualities to that animal. Perhaps, however, this only happens for meat-eaters and not vegetarians, who on average attribute many more mental qualities to animals in the first place.

The entire article is here.

Human Emotion with June Gruber: Moral Emotions

Introduction of Human Emotions and Morality
Yale University

The Emotions That Prosecutors Elicit to Make Jurors Vote Guilty

Jurors experiencing “moral outrage” will be more likely to convict, and changes in technology are making this a bigger factor.

By Lauren Kirchner
The Pacific Standard
Originally published December 4, 2013

Here is an excerpt:

Recently, two psychologists teamed up to analyze and identify the emotions that have the most impact on the outcome of jury trials. They had participants in mock trials read scenarios and look at crime-scene evidence, and keep track of their feelings throughout the experiment. The researchers found that anger paired with disgust makes up the powerful mix of emotions that we often call “moral outrage.” The authors also concluded that this particular response—more than sadness, more than the desire for vengeance, more than any other emotion—is the one that most often brings jurors to vote to convict, and to be confident in those convictions.

“Humans intuitively understand what moral outrage is,” said Jessica M. Salernoo, co-author of the study, published in the journal Psychological Science. “However, researchers debate its emotional components. We wanted to investigate the relationships between anger and disgust since emotions tend to co-occur with each other.” Salerno and her co-author, Liana C. Peter-Hagene, note that this mix of emotions is entirely involuntary, and the jurors can often be unaware that they are feeling it—which makes it that much more effective.

The entire article is here.

The Meaning of Disgust: A Refutation

Strohminger, N. (in press). The Meaning of Disgust: A Refutation. Emotion Review

Abstract

Recently, McGinn (2011) has proposed a new theory of disgust.  This theory makes empirical claims as to the history and function of disgust, yet does not take into account contemporary scientific research on the subject.  This essay evaluates his theory for its merits as an account of disgust, and as a piece of scholarship more generally, and finds it lacking.

Introduction

In disgust research, there is shit, and then there is bullshit.  McGinn's (2011) theory belongs to the latter category.

The entire article is here.  And yes, there is some humor here.

The Interactive Effect of Anger and Disgust on Moral Outrage and Judgments

By Jessica M. Salerno and Liana C. Peter-Hagene
Psychological Science, October 2013; vol. 24, 10: pp. 2069-2078.
first published on August 22, 2013

Abstract

The two studies reported here demonstrated that a combination of anger and disgust predicts moral outrage. In Study 1, anger toward moral transgressions (sexual assault, funeral picketing) predicted moral outrage only when it co-occurred with at least moderate disgust, and disgust predicted moral outrage only when it co-occurred with at least moderate anger. In Study 2, a mock-jury paradigm that included emotionally disturbing photographs of a murder victim revealed that, compared to anger, disgust was a more consistent predictor of moral outrage (i.e., it predicted moral outrage at all levels of anger). Furthermore, moral outrage mediated the effect of participants’ anger on their confidence in a guilty verdict—but only when anger co-occurred with at least a moderate level of disgust—whereas moral outrage mediated the effect of participants’ disgust on their verdict confidence at all levels of anger. The interactive effect of anger and disgust has important implications for theoretical explanations of moral outrage, moral judgments in general, and legal decision making.

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General Discussion

Two studies confirmed that moral outrage is distinguishable from pure anger by demonstrating that moral outrage results from a combination of anger and disgust—even when the transgression did not include a body-disgust violation (funeral picketing). Despite often being characterized as the central emotional component of moral outrage, anger predicted moral outrage only when it co-occurred with at least a moderate level of disgust, and disgust predicted moral outrage only when it co-occurred with at least a moderate level of anger. In fact, disgust was a more consistent predictor of moral outrage in Study 2—it significantly predicted moral outrage at all levels of anger (and even in the absence of anger). This may be the case because disgust (vs. anger) is more resistant to mitigating evidence (Russell & Giner-Sorolla, 2011), which was presented in Study 2 (i.e., the defense’s case) but not in Study 1.

Furthermore, moral outrage mediated the effect of both disgust and anger on judgments with serious real-life consequences: murder verdicts. Anger increased moral outrage, which in turn increased participants’ confidence in a guilty verdict—but only when it co-occurred with at least moderate levels of disgust. Disgust predicted confidence in a guilty verdict through moral outrage, however, at all levels of anger. Because both anger and disgust are associated with certainty appraisals that decrease cognitive processing, each emotion might encourage greater reliance on the other when making judgments.

The entire article is here.

Morality, Disgust, and Countertransference in Psychotherapy

John D. Gavazzi, Psy.D., ABPP

Samuel Knapp, Ed.D., ABPP

            

At the most basic level, successful outcomes in psychotherapy require a strong therapeutic alliance between psychologist and patient. A strong therapeutic bond can be cultivated in many different ways including, but not limited to, similarities between psychologist and patient (such as age, socioeconomic status, gender, etc.), psychologist empathy and acceptance, and patient confidence in the psychologist’s skills. A similarity in moral beliefs likely enhances the working relationship and correlates with positive outcomes in psychotherapy.

            

Just as shared values and moral similarities can strengthen the therapeutic relationship, negative moral judgments about a patient’s behaviors and beliefs (both past and current) can erode or rupture the helping relationship. In clinical terms, moral judgments can lead to negative countertransference. When a psychologist experiences a negative, morally-driven emotion related to the patient, this dynamic may adversely affect the quality of the therapeutic relationship. Within the therapeutic discourse, there are many topics related to the patient’s values, personal responsibility, and moral behaviors. Moral judgments and beliefs, like countertransference, are complex, intuitive, automatic, and emotional. In this article, we will focus on one theory of moral origins to understand how these complicated, instinctive, and gut-level reactions may promote negative countertransference.

The entire article is here.

Survival’s Ick Factor

By JAMES GORMAN
The New York Times
Published: January 23, 2012

Disgust is the Cinderella of emotions. While fear, sadness and anger, its nasty, flashy sisters, have drawn the rapt attention of psychologists, poor disgust has been hidden away in a corner, left to muck around in the ashes.

No longer. Disgust is having its moment in the light as researchers find that it does more than cause that sick feeling in the stomach. It protects human beings from disease and parasites, and affects almost every aspect of human relations, from romance to politics.

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It adds to the popularity of disgust as a subject of basic research that it is easier to elicit in an ethical manner than anger or fear. You don’t have to insult someone or make anyone afraid for his or her life — a bad smell will do the trick. And disgust has been relatively easy to locate in the brain, where it frequents the insula, the amygdala and other regions.

The entire story is here.

Hard Feelings: The Moral Psychology of Contempt - Book Review

Macalester Bell, Hard Feelings: The Moral Psychology of Contempt, Oxford University Press, 2013 ISBN 9780199794140.

Reviewed by Robert C. Roberts, Baylor University

Macalester Bell defends contempt as a moral emotion and recommends cultivating a disposition to feel apt contempt. She endorses a general account of emotions on which they are "cognitive" without implying belief or judgment of their content; rather, they are perception-like, "presenting" objects in one evaluative dimension or another. Contempt in particular has four salient properties. 1) It takes whole persons (rather than persons' actions or character traits) as its object; thus it is a "globalist" or "totalizing" evaluative perception of its target (usually some person or group, though institutions can also be contemned). 2) It is a "dismissive and insulting attitude that manifests disregard for its target" (8, italics original), presenting him or her as low in status by some standard of value that the subject cares about. 3) It is comparative or reflexive; "the contemnor makes a comparison between herself and the object of her contempt, and sees the contemned as inferior to her along some axis of comparison" (41). 4) Characteristically the subject shuns or withdraws from involvement with the object of contempt.

Bell clarifies the concept of contempt by comparing it with other hard feelings. Whereas contempt focuses on a person, attributes "badbeing," and motivates withdrawal, resentment focuses on an act, attributes wrongdoing, and motivates engagement with the target. Disgust is like contempt in presenting its object as "threatening" and motivating withdrawal, but it differs in often involving a somatic reaction, in not being hierarchical, comparative, and reflexive, and in construing its object as contaminated rather than low in status. Moral hatred differs from moral contempt in not being necessarily comparative and in motivating active engagement with the object rather than withdrawal. Bell also distinguishes active from passive contempt: whereas active contempt presents the target as "threatening," passive contempt hardly presents the target at all, regarding and treating the target as almost beneath notice. Most of the book is about active contempt, though it contains nice discussions of passive contempt as commended by Aristotle and Nietzsche. Bell also discusses Kant's discussion of contempt, and shows it to be surprisingly sympathetic to this emotion.

The entire review is here.

A Bad Taste in the Mouth: Gustatory Disgust Influences Moral Judgment

Kendall J. Eskine, Natalie A. Kacinik, and Jesse J. Prinz
Psychological Science, March 2011 vol. 22 no. 3 295-299

Abstract

Can sweet-tasting substances trigger kind, favorable judgments about other people? What about substances that are disgusting and bitter? Various studies have linked physical disgust to moral disgust, but despite the rich and sometimes striking findings these studies have yielded, no research has explored morality in conjunction with taste, which can vary greatly and may differentially affect cognition. The research reported here tested the effects of taste perception on moral judgments. After consuming a sweet beverage, a bitter beverage, or water, participants rated a variety of moral transgressions. Results showed that taste perception significantly affected moral judgments, such that physical disgust (induced via a bitter taste) elicited feelings of moral disgust. Further, this effect was more pronounced in participants with politically conservative views than in participants with politically liberal views. Taken together, these differential findings suggest that embodied gustatory experiences may affect moral processing more than previously thought.

The article is here.

For some, it matters who's donating an organ, blood

University of Michigan
Press Release - June 18, 2013

ANN ARBOR—Some people feel so "creeped out" that they would decline an organ or blood that came from a murderer or thief, according to a new University of Michigan study.

In addition, they express concern that their personality or behavior may change to become more like that of the donor, as a result of the donation.

Recipients prefer to get an organ or DNA transplant or blood transfusion from a donor whose personality or behavior matches theirs, said Meredith Meyer, the study's lead author and a research fellow in psychology. People think that people's behaviors and personalities are partly due to something hidden deep inside their blood or bodily organs, she said.

What surprised Meyer and colleagues were that the results from blood transfusions were just as strong as the results from heart transplants.

"Since blood transfusions are so common and relatively straightforward, we had expected people might think that they have very little effect," Meyer said.

"This suggests an interesting intuitive belief—that behaviors and personalities are inherent, unchanging aspects of who they are," said study co-author Susan Gelman, the Heinz Werner Collegiate Professor of Psychology.

The study's participants viewed a list of possible human donors and judged whether they wanted someone who shared similar traits, such as age, gender, sexual orientation and background. Possible donors also included two animals: a pig or a chimpanzee. For human donors described as having the same gender, the characteristics could be positive (e.g., high IQ, talented artist, kind person or philanthropist) or negative (e.g., low IQ, thief, gambler or murderer).

Respondents ranked how much they liked the idea of each being a donor, as well as assessed their beliefs that the transplant would cause the recipient's personality or behavior to become similar to the donor's. Questions also involved feeling "creeped out" or "contaminated" by the transplant.

The entire press release is here.